Stress and anxiety are an
unfortunate, but common and inevitable feature of modern life.
As with diet,
obesity, alcohol and smoking I am afraid that the news is
simple. They have to be addressed as part of a holistic approach to
coping with Fibromyalgia and CFS.
Learning to deal with stress is something that can
be consciously learned and practiced and new techniques have proven very
effective.
A higher than average
percentage of patients undergoing
Fibromyalgia and Chronic Fatigue treatment are, or were, engaged in high
stress environments and/or suffer from anxiety.
This may be or have
been at home, as carers of relatives or young children. It may have been
in work detail or during a divorce or home move.
Whatever the cause a
significant increase in stress and anxiety is frequently cited at the time of onset of
the sufferers Fibromyalgia or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
symptoms.
As well as being
implicated pre-onset of the Syndrome, stress reactions are involved in
the maintenance and exacerbation of the Syndrome post-onset.
Blood pressure, heart rate, the entire endocrine
system which controls hormone production are all implicated and involved
during stress
reactions and unfortunately the system that directly controls all these
systems, the Autonomic Nervous
System, in particular the Sympathetic
Nervous Systems or "day nerve" remain malfunctional
post-onset.
The result,
unfortunately will be an exacerbated negative
reaction of your Fatigue and Fibromyalgia symptoms to stress and anxiety
producing situations.
To make matters worse
there is evidence that once
activated the stress reaction lasts abnormally longer in patients
afflicted with Fibromyalgia and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
Is CFS more common in
stressed or anxious people
Let me first give a very broad outline of how
general medical advice is presented to healthcare providers in
diagnosing Fibromyalgia and CFS patients:
"frequently seen
characteristics of CFS and Fibromyalgia patients
In itself this is not an inaccurate
description of frequently seen characteristics of Fibromyalgia and CFS
sufferers. However it is so broad that it can describe patients with a
multitude of other conditions.
As I have said many times the human body is a remarkably resilient
organism, able to accommodate fantastic pressures and stresses, but as
with all machines and organisms there comes a breaking point.
Stress and anxiety appear to be a very large facilitating factor for people who
become the
unfortunate ones
to develop CFS and Fibromyalgia after a "trigger" infection or trauma.
A lesser but analogous example of stress related conditions
are those referred to as
“burnout", or simply stress and I quote.
"A series of personal life circumstances combine to create
a “breaking
point”, for example; death of a close family member, chronic pain,
moving house, bullying at work, divorce, separation, financial
loss or redundancy have all been linked to detrimental changes in health
"
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How
stress and anxiety can become a causal factor in Fibromyalgia and CFS
The initial trauma that was the notable
“trigger” of your CFS or Fibromyalgia is usually cited as a bacterial/viral or chemically
invasive attack of some kind, but it has been noted that in some
sufferers extreme acute stress and anxiety, such as bereavement, divorce, bullying,
extremes of overwork may also be a trigger for CFS symptoms in the
absence of a notable infection or exposure.
This makes sense in that
scientific evidence has shown conclusively that stress lowers our immune defenses against infection as
witnessed by white blood cell and lymphocyte
counts.
Also, stress and
anxiety have been shown to directly affect the
body in the short to medium term causing extreme fatigue and more disabling problems such as migraine,
impairment of concentration and memory, interrupted sleep patterns and
depression.
Fortunately, as a society we have been woken up to
the negative effects of stress and anxiety.
As is often the case it has taken the
negative economic implications of excess anxiety and stress to spur employers and healthcare providers into
action.
Sufferers no
longer have to fight against the labeling that was common with previous
generations which took the basic premise that “stress, depression and
anxiety are all in the mind and are a sign of weakness”
How stress
and anxiety can maintain and exacerbate CFS and Fibromyalgia
Stress, depression and anxiety are known to slow
down and in severe cases prevent recovery from infectious illnesses, and
this is partly where the confusion and malpractice surrounding the CFS/depression arena
was instigated and fed by general practice and psychologists over the last few decades.
The dividing line between the two conditions can
appear very fine to the untrained eye, but on closer inspection CFS and
Fibromyalgia do in fact have a totally unique subset of features when
compared to depressions of all types
To further muddy the waters both CFS and
depression cause physical symptoms which can be similar to each other on
initial presentation and also there is definitive crossovers of the symptoms of
various infectious illnesses of the rheumatic and auto-immune
spectrum.
As I have mentioned several times in my text,
establishment apathy and nonchalance regarding the true nature of CFS and Fibromyalgia
have lead to it being sidelined as a subdivision of psychology and
particularly depression.
Historically, when help is sought, sufferers are
left feeling
isolated and misunderstood to the extent that they will begin to hide
their symptoms, live in denial worried about other peoples reactions,
and press on regardless while understating their illness.
Unfortunately, these typical reactions only
serve to heighten overall stress and anxiety levels which is precisely the
opposite of the reaction we are seeking to promote recuperation, and so
the sufferer experiences a
further exacerbation and worsening of symptoms.
A lot of sufferers understandably avoid further
professional help.
Some work very hard to find a cure and convince
people that CFS/ME/Fibromyalgia is a real illness. This leads to sufferers
experiencing a desperate urgency to recover which is met and fed by a cynical
and irresponsible health industry full of fake cures, miracle pills
and treatments.
All this while sufferers are feeling
threatened,
scared, angry, stigmatized and generally ill.
The stress and
anxiety cycle goes even higher, and the result,
sufferers sink even lower.
There are times in a
person life when it may become particularly
difficult to actually be ill at all.
For example as a carer of an ill relative, or a
baby or young children, during a period of house renovation or
construction, the demands of work as primary source of income.
In the absence of people that can help practically
and emotionally in these life scenarios it can be very difficult to
actually say “STOP”
Traditional medicine understood the importance of
recuperation, rest, relaxation and contemplation as an important
therapeutical facet of overcoming serious illnesses and infections.
In the presence of a frightening array of diseases
which are now largely purged from modern society, and the absence of powerful
antibiotics and antivirals, painkillers and analgesics, the body was
largely left to its own devices.
In Traditional
medicine patients were often treated with herbal tonics and natural cures,
a lot of these were incidentally quite effective but have now been
largely forgotten, dismissed or dismantled and reproduced in synthetic
form to provide the basis of 75% of modern pharmaceuticals.
However the primary
strategy of the era involved long periods of rest and recuperation.
By contrast, modern medicine and society
place
more importance on masking the symptoms, "keeping a stiff upper
lip",
"knocking it on the head"
and "getting back on the job" as quickly as possible.
A "get well
quick" protocol which unfortunately is completely at odds with a
recuperative strategy for illnesses such as CFS and
fibromyalgia.
Learning to control and reduce stress
and anxiety is an
important and essential adjunct to any CFS and Fibromyalgia recovery
strategy.
You will need to learn how to recognize stress
and anxiety patterns and how
to short circuit the sequence of events that lead to a "stress
spiral".
Techniques of physical and psychological
relaxation are essential and very effective.
Learning when to say NO is essential and avoiding
all events and activities that place you under unnecessary stress or
anxiety are essential in the short to medium term.
In my next article on this subject I will be
talking about techniques that can be used effectively to short circuit
and alleviate stress and anxiety at home, in the car and at the
workplace.
Copyright: The Mellington Clinic And Associates :
2007:
stress, anxiety, sufferers, symptoms, depression
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